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Ice Hockey and Photos

I just got back from a weekend in Chicago watching my youngest grandsons play ice hockey. I discovered a few things.

*Ice hockey is exciting to watch! It moves very fast.

*6 and 8 year old boys can skate amazingly well, backwards and in circles. They can turn and stop on a dime.

*Hockey rinks are encircled by plexiglass for the safety of the observers and to the consternation of grandmothers trying to photograph their precious grandchildren. What crummy photos you get through plexiglass, especially when the plexiglass is all scratched and full of smears.

*If anyone has photographed ice hockey, I would love any pointers you might have!

No advice on shooting ice hockey, Lynn, but I will commiserate that trying to get shots of chickens is just about as hard. They're like toddlers; they're never still. And you have to shoot through chicken wire which makes focusing a real challenge.

I have a ton of hockey photos, all through plexiglass. I thought most of them came out good. The ones I took from really high up turn out better, because I can aim the line of sight over the boards, unless I want a shot in the near goal. This is TJ Oshie at full-speed during a warm up drill through the glass, and yes it is a little blurry because I was still trying to set my shutter speed. I think I was at 1/200, 5.6, ISO 800. Later on in the game I dialed to 1/250 and those were better.

Here is one of the all-out action during the game, from the very top row in the PNC Arena (I think it seats about 20,000?). Not as much detail. Also if there are no restrictions on lenses, a faster lens will do better. I can't bring a lens longer than 4" into the PNC Arena so I have to use my junky kit telephoto. The photos from up high are a lot darker because the lighting is so bad in the rafters. So if you are on ice level, maybe use a longer lens so you can blur the boards and focus on the skaters on the ice.